


Five Times Gerry Found Michael (And One Time He Didn't)

by cedarbranch



Series: I've Been Lost [1]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: 5+1 Things, Canonical Character Death, Fluff and Angst, It/Its Pronouns for The Distortion (The Magnus Archives), M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-30
Updated: 2020-03-30
Packaged: 2021-03-01 02:55:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,714
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23387722
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cedarbranch/pseuds/cedarbranch
Summary: Michael gets lost. Gerry finds him. It's what they do.
Relationships: Gerard Keay/Michael, Gerard Keay/Michael Shelley
Series: I've Been Lost [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1684690
Comments: 26
Kudos: 198





	Five Times Gerry Found Michael (And One Time He Didn't)

_i._

Technically speaking, Gerry does not have access to the archives. He doesn’t work at the Institute, and Gertrude’s never given him explicit permission to go poking around—but she must’ve noticed by now, and she hasn’t said anything, so he takes that as a go-ahead. He’s around often enough that no one really questions it, anyway. 

His combat boots clunk against the tile floor as he makes his way through the archives. His research typically has him hunting for two things: Leitners, or people that can lead him to them. Today, it’s the latter. He knows there’s a wicked old copy of _Studies in Hysteria_ somewhere, but it seems like the last buyer made the unfortunate mistake of reading it. After that, the poor bastard got so paranoid, it’s hard to tell if he’s even still alive or just hiding out in a bunker somewhere. Hopefully, the archives will have something helpful.

Gerry passes by the section of files on the Desolation, which he’s grown unfortunately familiar with—it’s a treat in itself to be able to walk past it for once—and stops as the sound of something shifting comes from one of the aisles ahead of him. So he’s not alone, then. That’s fine. There are always archival assistants milling about someplace or another. He keeps walking, glancing down into the aisles.

He appears to have been correct—there’s a young man leaning against one of the shelves about halfway down, a file open in his hands. As Gerry walks by, his head snaps up, and he nearly drops it. “E-excuse me!” he calls out.

God, not now. Gerry doesn’t have the energy. 

“Excuse me!” 

Too late to lose him, then. Gerry sighs and stops walking, waiting for him to catch up. “Yes?” he says.

The assistant stops in front of him. He tucks a long curl of blond hair behind his ear, smiling nervously. “Hi, I, um—sorry to bother you. I’ve gotten myself a bit lost over here, a-and I was wondering if you could help me out? I’ve seen you around a few times before.”

“I don’t work here,” Gerry says flatly.

“Oh, I know. O-or I figured, at least. But I still thought you might know your way around a little better than me. I only started working here a couple weeks ago, you see, and the head archivist’s filing system is, um… It’s kind of—”

“Incomprehensible?” Gerry finishes. “Yeah. I’m familiar.” He holds out his hand. The assistant blinks.

“Oh!” he says belatedly. “Right, here you are.”

He hands over the file, and Gerry flips through it. It’s a statement dated from last week, with a few photos attached to the back. A quick skim makes it apparent that this one deals with the Corruption. Gerry hands it back. “Closest shelf to the elevator, ‘bout halfway down the aisle,” he says. “Just put it wherever it fits chronologically.”

The assistant furrows his brow. “But the statements are all out of—”

“They’re not out of order. There should be a little pocket in that area where they start going in a proper timeline again. Also,” Gerry opens the folder and points at a section of text, “This name here, Amherst? Make a copy of the file, then find the folder with his name on it and stick it in there. Make sure there’s notes on everything so if one copy gets lost, you’ll know there’s another somewhere else.”

The assistant sighs. “Right,” he murmurs. “Suppose I shouldn’t have expected it to be straightforward.”

“You really shouldn’t,” Gerry says, half-smiling in spite of himself. He can’t imagine what it’s like to work at the Magnus Institute without knowing about the Fears. It must be unbearable.

“How’d you learn all this, then, if you don’t work here?” the assistant says curiously.

Gerry thinks for a moment. “I guess you could say I’m an independent researcher,” he says. “Been here often enough to know how Gertrude runs the place.”

“Oh, you know Gertrude!” the assistant says, smiling widely. “I’ve been working with her quite a lot lately. She’s great, isn’t she? I’m Michael, by the way.” 

“Gerard Keay,” says Gerard. “Do me a favor and don’t tell her you saw me here? Thanks.” And with that, he starts his way down the row of shelves once more.

“O-okay!” Michael calls after him. “Nice meeting you! If you ever need anything, I-I’ll be here to help!”

If he’s working in close proximity to Gertrude Robinson, Gerry highly doubts that.

_ii._

Michael turns the map sideways in his hands. His nose crinkles as he looks at it, and he turns it over once more. 

Watching is getting unbearable. Gerry sighs. “Give it here,” he says. 

“Sorry,” Michael says sheepishly. “My sense of direction’s rubbish, I should’ve warned you ahead of time.”

“More like Gertrude should have,” Gerry mutters. She doesn’t ask him to come along on her little trips abroad very often, and when she does, it’s usually just the two of them. Gerry’s only met Michael a couple of times, but it’s enough to establish that he’s not the ideal person to be hunting down artifacts with.

There’s nothing wrong with _him_ , of course; it’s not personal. It’s just that he doesn’t _know_. He has no clue what they’re really looking for, which factors are irrelevant and which are a sure sign they’re on the right track. It makes the whole process less efficient. Gerry doesn’t know why Gertrude doesn’t just tell him.

Well, that’s not true. That would make it harder to lie to him. 

But Gerry wishes there was another reason.

Michael’s actually quite nice. A little awkward, sure, with his default state of being set to _anxious_ , but he’s good company. It’s been a while since Gerry’s met an Institute worker like him. He’s seen enough to know that the world isn’t quite as pleasant as most people think it is, but not enough to stop him from cracking terrible puns every ten minutes and rambling about the latest Netflix original he’s been bingeing. Gerry finds himself smiling more than usual around him. 

Of course, that’s just another reason why they shouldn’t be working together. 

“What are you getting?” Michael asks, leaning over Gerry’s shoulder to look at the map. “I think we’re by this little square here,” he points at a speck near the middle, “but I don’t know what direction we ought to go.”

Gerry looks around, taking note of the nearest street sign, and turns the map back to the correct orientation. “This way,” he says, pointing to the right.

Michael squints. “Are you sure?” he asks.

“Positive,” says Gerry. 

Michael sighs. “I wish Google Maps worked here. Someone really ought to update their… well, whatever it is. I wished it worked in rural places.”

As faulty as Google Maps may be when roaming old Spanish towns, Gerry’s pretty sure it’s not just the app that’s causing them trouble. There’s something off about this entire area. He’s not going to say that to Michael, though. He just hums in agreement and starts walking, letting Michael trot along at his side. 

_iii._

Gertrude doesn’t seem to take Michael along on many missions that are truly dangerous. If she did, Gerry would have to have a conversation with her about liabilities and undue risk to their goals. But then she would give him that look she gets when she knows a little too much, and he’d have to shut up and never mention Michael in front of her again, and that wouldn’t be ideal. 

It’s not until the fourth time Gerry and Michael go out on a mission together that something goes really wrong. It’s supposed to be simple—they’re just supposed to cause a distraction so that this guy, who may or may not be an avatar of the Stranger, is away from his house long enough for Gertrude to break in. The Desolation isn’t supposed to show up. 

But of course, Gerry’s attracted a _little_ too much attention from the Cult of the Lightless Flame in all his time hunting Leitners, and they pick exactly the wrong moment to catch up with him. Gerry gets a blast of heat to the arm before he’s able to grab Michael and run.

“What the hell was that?” Michael gasps. “That woman, sh-she—that wasn’t—oh my God, _what_?” 

“Save the shock,” Gerry says through gritted teeth. Son of a bitch. He’s got a knife in his boot, but that’s not going to help them. It’d probably melt on impact. He grabs Michael by the back of his jacket and hauls him around a corner. Michael yelps and almost trips over himself, but doesn’t slow down. 

Gerry risks a glance over his shoulder. The cultists are still on their backs, only about fifty feet away now. _Shit_.

Gerry’s feet pound against the pavement. His backpack digs into his shoulders, the weight of it smacking against his back. He runs through a mental map in his head. There’s no underground stations close enough, no way to make a quick escape. Taking this into a public space is a terrible idea, anyway. There’s nowhere to run. They need their own way out. Something fast. Something… _vast_.

“Listen close,” Gerry says in between gulps for air. “I’m about to do something stupid. You keep running, stay far away, got it?”

Michael looks at him with alarm. “What? Gerry, I—Gerry!”

“I said, keep running!” 

Gerry skids to a halt and crouches down, ripping open his bag. There it is. He pulls out the Leitner and jumps to his feet. The cultists’ nasty grins get wider and wider as they gain on him. Twenty feet. Ten feet. Three, two, one— 

Gerry throws the book open and thrusts it out, facing them. 

Space distorts around his hands. He turns his head, squeezing his eyes shut. There’s a rumble, a groan of bending metal, a rush of air past his ears. His hair whips around his face. One of the cultists screams, but it’s lost to the roar of the wind. 

When the sound reaches deafening proportions, he slams the book shut. 

He holds it between his hands, panting, strands of hair obscuring his vision. The cultists are gone. So is one of the cars that had been parked on the side of the road. The nearest streetlamp is bent near-perpendicular, like a sunflower twisting toward the light. 

Gerry sweeps his hair out of his face and turns around.

Michael is standing only a few feet away, his eyes wide as planets.

Gerry shoves the Leitner back into his backpack and throws it over his shoulder, stalking up to Michael. “What the hell are you still doing here?” he demands. “I told you to run!”

“I-I know,” says Michael. “I couldn’t just leave you, though!”

“Yes, you could have! You should’ve, you—you could’ve died, Michael!” Gerry grabs him by the shoulders and gives him a shake. “Listen. For future reference. If I tell you to run, then for fuck’s sake, just _run_.”

“I won’t,” Michael says stubbornly. “Even if you ask, I won’t leave you.”

Gerry searches his expression. As pale and trembling as Michael may be, he still manages to set his jaw and maintain eye contact with Gerry. God. Michael has no idea of the life he’s living. That kind of blind faith is… 

It’s breathtaking. Having it directed at him in full force feels like a punch to the gut.

“There was nothing you could’ve done,” Gerry says. “I had a plan, you idiot.”

“And it worked. So what’s the problem?”

“What if you had gotten caught up in the crossfire? I didn’t even have time to see if there was anyone else walking by when I did that, Michael, if you’d been standing there…” 

Michael cringes. “I-I know. You’re right, I know it was dangerous, a-and stupid, but—I didn’t know what you were going to do! You could’ve just jumped on them and tried to kill them yourself for all I knew!”

“Okay, first of all, I’m not that stupid,” Gerry says, breathing out a quick laugh. “And second of all, even if I did, it would be because I wanted you to make it out.”

Michael shakes his head. “I wouldn’t leave you behind,” he says once again, quietly this time. He places his hand over Gerry’s, which is still on his shoulder. Gerry’s heart has been racing ever since he started running, but for some reason, it’s this that makes it skip a beat. 

“You’re a bloody moron, then,” Gerard whispers. 

Michael bites his lip. “Maybe,” he says, looking the slightest bit scared. 

And that’s when he surges forward and kisses Gerry square on the mouth.

Gerry’s brain goes blank. His body goes numb, then rushes with heat, and then all he can feel is Michael against him, overwhelmingly sweet. He’s so stupid, God, this is so stupid of him—but he grabs onto the back of Michael’s jumper and kisses him back. Michael makes a surprised little noise, and his mouth softens against Gerry’s. Gerry threads his fingers through his hair. 

It takes him a while to break away. “Next time,” he whispers against Michael’s lips, “you run. ‘Kay?”

_iv._

Gerry’s phone buzzes in his pocket. He pulls it out, and Michael’s contact photo pops up. Gerry hits accept. “Hey,” he says. “Where are you?”

“Okay, here’s the thing,” Michael says. “I know you said it was right by your flat, but—”

“You got lost,” Gerry deadpans.

“Oh, don’t _say_ it like that, you make me sound ridiculous!” Michael says, laughing. 

“Which you are.”

“I _know_ that, Gerry Keay, thank you so much. Now will you please take pity on me and give me directions to your cafe?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Gerry says airily. “It’s awfully rude to be late for a date, you know.”

“Gerry,” Michael whines.

“All right, all right. But only because I like you. Where are you now?”

Michael relays his location. Gerry has no idea how he’s managed to get himself so turned around, but that’s Michael for you. Gerry stays on the phone and keeps him going in the right direction, until he catches sight of him out the window and waves. Michael’s face lights up. “There you are!” he says, waving wildly back. Gerry’s heart just might swell out of his chest. He’s not sure what it is. Maybe it’s just… well, nobody’s ever seemed so happy to see him. 

A few seconds later, Michael’s through the front door and making his way to Gerry’s table. “Thanks for rescuing me,” he says, swooping down and giving Gerry a kiss on the cheek. 

“Always,” Gerry says, smiling so wide it hurts.

_v._

Gerry keeps one arm wrapped loosely around Michael’s hip. He’s sound asleep, his breathing deep and steady. Gerry strokes his thumb across the soft exposed skin where his shirt rides up. He smells nice; not like anything Gerry can place, but something gentle and clean and quintessentially _Michael_. 

It’s moments like this that make it all worth it. All the horror, all the trauma… it all feels so far away when they’re like this. It’s just the two of them in the island that is Michael’s bed, comfortable in their own little piece of reality. 

Gerry smooths Michael’s hair out of the way and places a soft kiss on the back of his neck. Then he closes his eyes and inhales deeply, willing sleep to come and take him away, too.

He nearly gets there. His mind is just beginning the hazy slide into dreams when he feels Michael twitch. Gerry’s thoughts arrange themselves back into something more resembling consciousness. Michael jerks, his entire body shuddering beneath Gerry’s touch, and just like that, Gerry is awake.

He sits up a bit. “Michael,” he whispers. 

Michael’s breaths come shallow. He’s got a death grip on the blanket. Gerry gives his arm a gentle squeeze. “Michael,” he whispers again. “Wake up.”

Michael makes a quiet sound of distress. Gerry reaches to shake him awake, but then he jerks again and pushes himself bolt upright with a cry. His chest heaves. Gerry sits up and wraps his arms around him, keeping him close and secure. Michael struggles a bit, but Gerry just runs his hands through his hair. “Shh,” he says soothingly. “It’s okay. It was just a dream, I’m here.”

Michael clings to him. Gerry can’t see in the dark, but he can hear Michael crying, feel it in the slight shake when he inhales. Gerry presses a kiss to his cheek. “You’re okay,” he says. “I’ve got you.”

They sit in silence for a while. Gerry can feel Michael’s pulse slow. 

“Did I ever tell you about my friend Ryan?” Michael whispers.

“No,” says Gerry. “You don’t have to, if you don’t want.”

“N-no, it’s alright. I just… when I was in school, I had a friend who… Well, he might’ve been schizophrenic, but that never mattered. Now I’m not too sure if he was or not. He was acting off one day, so I followed him, and h-he… I still don’t know how to describe what happened. I never could. I thought _I’d_ gone mad for the longest time.”

Gerry’s heart sinks. He can see where this is going; he’s read enough statements to know what these stories tend to look like. How people talk about them.

“Point is, _something_ happened to him, s-something killed him. And after that I always felt like… like it was waiting out there for me, too. I got paranoid, and that just made me feel more like him, and now I go to sleep and I don’t know where I am, I’m just lost, except I can see that _thing_ and Ryan and the way it _twisted_ —“

“Hey,” Gerry says, squeezing Michael closer to his side. “It’s over now, okay? You’re safe now. You’re right here, at home, and I won’t let anything get to you.”

Michael laughs quietly. “I-I’m not scared of monsters, don’t worry. I just… Sometimes I’m scared I’ll start seeing them where there’s nothing at all.”

“Well,” Gerry says, trying his best to keep his voice light, “If it’s any comfort, when you’re in our line of work, you’re far more likely to see something real. So if you see a monster, shoot first, ask questions later. Yeah?”

Michael hums to himself and shifts, pulling Gerry down for a kiss. “Thank you,” he murmurs.

“Course,” Gerry whispers in reply. 

There are so many things he could say, so many missing pieces that he could fill in, but he knows it wouldn’t be a kindness. Michael is one of the rare ones who can see monsters and still walk away with the ability to smile. Gerry’s not going to be the one that shatters it for him.

At least not now. Not here, in this safe place, where the darkness is a comfort rather than threat. One day, maybe, when the time is right.

Now, the only thing that matters is that Michael is safe.

_vi._

Gerry should’ve seen it coming. He _had_ , from the very moment he’d met Michael, but, like a fool, he’d gone and started hoping things might be different. That Gertrude might take pity on him. That his life story wouldn’t be cut short with a sudden twist.

But it is.

Needless to say, Gerry doesn’t take it well. It’s half grief and half bitterness, beating the message into his own mind: he should never have gotten so attached. He can’t let it happen again. What a stupid thing, for someone with his knowledge to go and fall in— 

Well. It’s not like it matters anymore.

For a while, Gerry keeps working. No rest for the wicked and all that. He keeps hunting Leitners, maybe even more feverishly than before. Damn near gets himself killed over one of them. He doesn’t _expect_ the ground to start crumbling beneath him the second he turns the first page, but then again, Michael probably didn’t expect to—

It doesn’t matter.

After the next close call, though, it’s clear that work isn’t something Gerry can do right now. So he drinks instead. Wastes a lot of time on the internet. Avoids opening the camera roll on his phone, just in case he sees something he’d rather not remember.

That’s when the doors start showing up. Gerry notices at once. He’s been trained all his life to spot the supernatural in a crowd, so when it pops up in the middle of his living room, he knows what to do. He keeps a close eye on the thing and redoubles the protections on his flat.

Sometimes it leaves. But it comes back. It follows him outside, too; he’ll just be popping out for a coffee, and there, when he turns to leave, the entrance will have been replaced by something much yellower. 

It’s pissing him off. He knows what it is—there’s only one power that warps the air around it like that, makes looking at it feel like a headache. Gerry doesn’t have the time or patience to be dealing with the Spiral. If he wants reality to melt away, he’ll do it with whiskey, thanks very much. 

But the damn thing just sits there, innocent as can be, where he can’t ignore it.

“All right,” Gerry finally says to it, standing in his living room and holding his sharpest knife out in front of him. “What do you want?”

No response. Typical.

It’s clearly not leaving, so Gerry has two options: open it, and probably die, or leave it alone, and let it stalk the borders of his consciousness for the rest of his life. He’s already had one demonic creature following him around, and she’d made his life a living hell before he’d managed to get rid of her. He’s not doing that again, even if this door is a damn sight less annoying than his mum’s ghost. 

So he grabs the handle, swings it open, and steps inside. 

The hallway within is bursting with bright colors and patterns that make his eyes hurt. Gerry winces, looking around for any sign of movement. The only thing he can see is the swirling of the patterns—except, no. There is something else. A shock of yellow at the end of the hall, just far enough that he can’t make it out. It looks like a person, though.

Meaning, it looks like the most killable thing in the area.

Gerry adjusts his grip on his knife and strides toward it. His heart pounds in his chest. He could very well die like this. But if he does, it’s going to be with his head held high, not running. “All right, you son of a bitch,” he says. “What the hell do you want from me?”

No matter how far he walks, the figure doesn’t seem to get any closer. From somewhere in the distance, the sound of laughter fades in, like its volume is being turned slowly up. It ripples in shapes Gerry can’t keep track of, and he shakes his head in frustration. The distortion keeps buzzing in his ears. 

“I just wanted to watch,” the figure says, its voice lilting and sweet in a cloying way Gerry can almost taste. “It’s not something I usually do, but then again, you are an exception in almost every sense of the word.”

“What’s that supposed to mean,” Gerry spits. His head is starting to hurt. He’s never been face-to-face with a Spiral avatar before, but he knows their tricks. Maybe that’s why this thing feels so familiar. 

“Oh, nothing. I just think you’re interesting.” The figure tilts its head. Gerry can’t seem to focus on any of its features; the best he can get is a vague impression of height and curls. The harder he tries to gain clarity, the more his vision swims. “You spend your life collecting knowledge of things like me, but none of them have marked you. Not even the Eye, though you stroll about its domain often enough.”

The way it says _Eye_ sends a shiver down Gerry’s spine. “You’re right,” he says. “None of them have marked me. Usually because I kill them before they can.”

The thing bursts out laughing again, and Gerry wishes he hadn’t said anything.

“I wonder what it would be like to take you,” it muses. “You are awfully close to the Eye, even if you reject it. You might break.” As it says the last word, its form, or at least Gerry’s perception of it, seems to splinter apart. Before he can even blink, it’s standing closer to him. That sensation is still there, on the tip of Gerry’s tongue, like he’s missing something. 

He thrusts out his knife. “Stay back,” he says. It’s useless, he knows, but better than looking scared.

The thing hums, amused. “Or maybe you wouldn’t,” it says. “Your mind… _burns_. To know. To destroy. To keep going.” It giggles. “To hope, even. Though I must say, that is the less wise part of you.”

“Fuck you,” Gerry snarls. “You don’t know anything about me.”

“Oh, now we both know that isn’t true,” the thing says. “I know very, very much about you, Gerry Keay.”

“It’s Gerard.”

“You let Michael call you Gerry,” the thing says. 

Gerry’s senses slide and slow. The world seems to stretch out around him, and just when it seems like he might lose himself, he snaps back into place with a ringing in his ears. He gasps. 

There it is.

The thing smiles at him with a smile that is not Michael’s, and a face that is not Michael’s, but oh, they _are_.

“Fuck you,” Gerry says again, shaky this time. 

The not-Michael laughs. It’s a twisted mockery of Michael’s laugh. The same little sigh clings to the edge of it, but it bends around itself, contorting into a new timbre. “You’re still very headstrong,” it says. “He liked that about you. Except for when it made him worry.”

“Don’t you dare talk about him,” Gerry says tightly. 

Gertrude never told him what happened in Sannikov Land. He hadn’t wanted to know, and he still doesn’t. But this… this is worse than anything he could’ve pictured.

If he gets out of this alive, he knows exactly whose throat this blade will meet next.

“Why not?” Michael asks.

“Because you _aren’t_ him.”

“That is correct. But I remember him, and I remember you. That’s why I’m here, you know.”

Gerry’s heart clenches. “What do you mean?” he asks.

Michael shrugs. “I wanted to see what happened to you.” A pause, then: “I wanted to see you.”

God, this is sick. Gerry swallows against the lump rising in his throat. “Well, you’ve seen,” he says. “So what now? You going to kill me?”

Michael frowns. “No,” it says. “I thought about it. But I don’t think I want to.”

Michael is gone. Gerry knows that. Believing that there’s anything left of him would be foolish, and would only get him hurt. But he can’t help wondering how similar this not-Michael is. How much it thinks like him. How much it feels. 

“I rather like you, Gerry,” it says. “So I don’t think I’ll be killing you.”

“Well,” Gerry manages. “Thanks for that, I guess.”

“You don’t need to thank me. There are many things that I want to do, but killing you is not one of them.” Michael reaches out, its fingers warped and spindly-sharp. Gerry jerks back. Michael just leans forward and brushes a lock of his hair behind his ear. Gerry swallows hard. With Michael closer to him, it somehow looks human; more like the Michael he knew. Gerry can see its eyes now, at least. They shift and morph from one color to another, hues and patterns filling them far beyond where irises should be. 

“I think I will keep watching you,” it says. 

Gerry should tell it to fuck off and stop masquerading as his boyfriend. Or to stop coming so close and torturing him with the knowledge of what he’s become, at least.

Instead, for some unknowable reason, he says, “Okay.”

Michael smiles. It’s all wrong, but Gerry’s chest aches all the same.

**Author's Note:**

> i would be open to writing a gerry/distortion sequel to this if thats something yall wanna see 👀
> 
> edit: ok yes i'm making a sequel fjknbfjghfh


End file.
